Question 1

They reached the Pole, found another country's flag already there, and died walking home. Why did they keep dragging sixteen kilograms of rock?

Accepted Answer

Because the rocks were the point. Scott's expedition was a scientific one that also went for the Pole, and inside those samples were fossil leaves proving Antarctica had once been a warm forest joined to other continents. They were found beside the bodies.

Question 2

Robert Falcon Scott: what happened in October 1910?

Accepted Answer

The telegram in Melbourne — Amundsen's message reaches him mid-voyage: the Fram is heading south too. Scott's expedition was planned as science with a Pole attempt attached; it has just become a race it was not designed for.

Question 3

Robert Falcon Scott: what happened in 1911?

Accepted Answer

The transport chain breaks — Motor sledges fail within days. The ponies, which have no fur and sink in soft snow, are shot. The dogs turn back by plan. From the Beardmore Glacier onward it is five men in harness, pulling everything themselves.

Question 4

Robert Falcon Scott: what happened in 17 January 1912?

Accepted Answer

The tent was already there — They reach the Pole and find Amundsen's flag and a letter waiting. Scott writes: "Great God! this is an awful place and terrible enough for us to have laboured to it without the reward of priority."

Question 5

Robert Falcon Scott: what happened in 16 March 1912?

Accepted Answer

Oates walks out — His feet are gangrenous and he knows he is slowing the others. He leaves the tent into a blizzard, saying: "I am just going outside and may be some time." His body was never found.

Question 6

Robert Falcon Scott: what happened in c. 29 March 1912?

Accepted Answer

Eleven miles short — Scott, Wilson and Bowers are pinned in their tent by a blizzard, eighteen kilometres from a full supply depot. Scott keeps writing letters and recording the temperature until he stops.

Question 7

Robert Falcon Scott: what happened in 2001?

Accepted Answer

The weather is checked — Susan Solomon compares the expedition's own temperature records with ninety years of later data and shows that March 1912 was 10–20°C colder than normal for three weeks. Their notes convicted and acquitted them at once.

Robert Falcon Scott — Antarctic · 1912 · second, and lost · Great Explorers

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